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Crypto Collectibles, Museum Funding and OpenGLAM

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Crypto Collectibles, Museum Funding and OpenGLAM ( crypto-collectibles-museum-funding-and-openglam )

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Appl. Sci. 2021, 11, 9931 2 of 19 or crypto- or digital collectibles, as they are also referred to, have already shown glimpses of their potential. Indicatively, the founder of Twitter, Jack Dorsey, sold his first ever tweet for 2.9 million USD as an NFT [6], whilst DJ Justin Blau auctioned the “world’s first tokenized album” for 11.6 million USD [7]. The current record for the most expensive NFT ever sold, is held by Christie’s for the auction of “5000 Everydays”. A digital image that is a mosaic of 5000 digital artworks by Mike Winkelmann, a digital artist also known as Beeple, was sold for 69 million USD, ranking as the third most expensive work sold at an auction by a living artist, surpassing auctions by Gerhard Richter, as well as most auctions for works by famous old masters, including Raphael and Titian [8]. The museum sector has already started exploring the potential of crypto collectibles. The Uffizi Gallery was the first major art museum to sell an NFT for an image of one of its Michelangelo masterpieces “Doni Tondo”, which sold for 170.000 USD [9], while the Hermitage Museum announced that it is planning to sell NFTs for famous pieces of its collection including works by Leonardo Da Vinci and Van Gogh [10]. However, NFTs have also attracted strong criticism. Firstly, the energy consumption associated with creating, which is commonly referred to as minting and trading NFTs is significant [11]. In addition, the anonymity that is ubiquitous in the crypto space provides fertile ground for bad actors seeking to exploit content that is freely available, such as the images made available through institutions that have adopted the OpenGLAM principles [12]. However, given the dire financial state of cultural heritage organisations, it is deemed necessary to explore this new medium and the opportunities it creates. This paper asks if it is appropriate for the heritage sector to embrace non-fungible tokens (NFTs), selling ownership of digitised images of collections items, to raise much needed revenue. How might such an initiative sit alongside the OpenGLAM movement, where galleries, libraries, archives and museums have been openly licensing images of items in their collections for others to use as they will? In this paper, we problematise beyond the hype of digital collectibles, exploring the opportunities, risks and challenges they present to the GLAM sector, concluding with recommendations for the sector, as well as for the academic community and researchers interested in exploring NFTs in relation to museum funding and openly licenced content. 2. Background 2.1. Long-Standing Financial Challenges of Museums and Countermeasures The ill financial health of institutions has long been one of the main challenges of the cultural heritage sector. The economic crisis of 2008 directly affected the sector [13], whilst the consecutive budget cuts that followed in the UK made securing funding one of the top challenges for British museums [14]. The extended and repeated closures due to COVID-19, caused a staggering 77% drop in attendance of art museums globally in 2020 [15], severely aggravating the situation, having a devastating impact on the financial health of cultural heritage institutions. Indicatively, two-thirds (i.e., 71%) of Scotland’s independent museums reported that they do not have funds to survive a year [16], whilst a report on the impact of COVID-19 on the museum sector revealed that 85% of museum directors were concerned about attracting audiences back [17]. To counter the sharp decline in revenue, museums turned to redundancies and deac- cessions. Even in the UK, where a multi-million-pound emergency funding was offered to the cultural heritage sector [18,19] redundancies were widespread. Even large, well- funded institutions were forced to reduce their staff, including the Tate, which cut 120 jobs (i.e., 12% of its workforce) [2] and the V&A, which cut 103 roles (i.e., 10% of staff) [20], including one-fifth of its curatorial team [21]. One of the arguably lesser-known functions of museums, i.e., deaccessioning, was also employed by museums in order to generate much-needed revenue. In the UK, despite the fact that “financially-motivated disposal [is] subject to particularly close scrutiny” [22], the Royal Opera House sold David Hockney’s “Portrait of Sir David Webster”, who was the General Administrator of the Royal Opera House for several decades [4]. The portrait was auctioned by Christie’s and it was sold for

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